Gym founder Jess Curl says allowing dogs helps members strike up conversations, with her unusual fitness business now expanding into Chapel St. Picture: Instagram/jess.curl
Former South Melbourne soccer player Jess Curl is bringing her mirror-free, dog-friendly gym chain to Chapel St, in its first move south of the Yarra.
Project Better opens its fifth Melbourne gym at Prahran’s Cecil Place precinct on November 28, adding to a business with more than 2000 members and four operating locations.
Ms Curl started training clients in her garage after a serious injury and has since opened gyms in Collingwood, Brunswick East, East Brunswick Village and West Melbourne.
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But Prahran was never on the original expansion plan.
Ms Curl said working again with developer Banco Group, following its East Brunswick Village project, helped persuade her to cross the river.
The new gym is being fitted out with architects JAM.
It will be open 24 hours, with saunas and cold therapy, but without mirrors, joining fees or lock-in contracts.
Dogs are welcome at Project Better’s gyms, although Curl recalled one cheeky puppy helping itself to a member’s lunch. Picture: Instagram/jess.curl
Project Better’s fifth Melbourne gym is set to open at Prahran’s Cecil Place precinct on November 28, marking its first move south of the Yarra. Picture: Supplied
Members can also bring their dogs.
Ms Curl calls Project Better the “anti-gym gym”.
The business has built its own software so customers can freeze or cancel memberships without having to front up to staff.
“You don’t have to come in and like sell your firstborn or anything like that,” Ms Curl said.
Ms Curl said her approach was shaped by an injury that upended her sporting career.
She earned a soccer scholarship to a US university before taking up Strongman training.
Curl went on to complete marathons and ultramarathons, despite a surgeon’s warning, and now wants to change how Australians approach exercise. Picture: Shannyn Higgins Photography
Project Better’s gyms ditch mirrors, joining fees and lock-in contracts, with saunas and cold therapy included in memberships. Picture: Shannyn Higgins Photography
In January 2016, while preparing for a competition, she ruptured her Achilles tendon.
A month after surgery, she ruptured it again.
Surgeons reconstructed the tendon using tissue from her big toe and she spent eight months largely confined to bed.
Ms Curl said a surgeon told her she would never run again.
“I remember looking down at my leg about six months in and like everything was just like soft and mush,” she said.
“I was just so devastated.”
Former South Melbourne Women’s Premier League player Jess Curl has turned a garage fitness business into a gym chain with more than 2000 members. Picture: Instagram/jess.curl
Two Project Better gym members take advantage of the cold plunge facilities, with saunas and cold therapy included in memberships alongside 24-hour gym access. Picture: Shannyn Higgins Photography
She has since completed marathons and ultramarathons, but said the recovery changed how she treated people starting exercise or returning from injury.
At Fitzroy’s public pool, she recalled strangers being patient while she moved around on crutches and a knee scooter.
“No one rushed me or made me feel bad,” she said.
Ms Curl said she wanted her gyms to offer the same welcome, with trainers who remembered names and noticed when regulars stopped turning up.
During Covid lockdowns, nearly 200 members kept paying to help the business survive with two more gyms are planned after Prahran.
As for bringing dogs into a workout, there has already been one casualty, a member’s lunch, eaten by a puppy after it was left on the floor.
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